If any of these are misstatements, I'd be relieved to hear it:
"...If these were major cocaine dealers, as alleged, they were among the oddest in the U.S.
The prosecution called only a handful "major" dealers. The rest were petty.
None of them had any money to speak of. And when they were arrested, they didn't have any cocaine. No drugs, money or weapons were recovered during the surprise roundup...
The warrants issued were arrest warrants because it was a sting. Search warrants were not executed.
...The entire operation was the work of a single police officer who claimed to have conducted an 18-month undercover operation.
The officer was an undercover agent of a regional drug task force. The county sheriff, the DA, several assistant DA's, and other members of the task force participated in the operation.
The arrests were made solely on the word of this officer, Tom Coleman, a white man with a wretched work history, who routinely referred to black people as "niggers" and who frequently found himself in trouble with the law.
I found no evidence to support the racial claims above.
In trial after trial, prosecutors put Mr. Coleman on the witness stand and his uncorroborated, unsubstantiated testimony was enough to send people to prison for decades.
11 of the 43 were convicted, 17 plead out, most with probation or suspended sentences. Of the 11, several are on appeal.
[In addition, some of those charged were able to prove they were elsewhere at the times he claimed to have bought drugs from them. - E]
One woman did this and the prosecutor dropped the charges. |
